Lost Beginnings
by bonegeisha
Summary: It's been a lifetime since Itachi's seen his little brother...But, he never lost track of him, even when he left Konoha. Now it's high time he saw the boy again; too bad Sasuke doesn't want to see him. --ItaSasu --yaoi some petting lol
1. Lost Beginnings

_~~**~~Well, another ItaSasu piece from me^^ I haven't done one in a long time, so I got the feeling these two were sulking about being left out lol So, this piece actually got away from me, even this early into it. I had originally intended to do alot more with it, but some how it came out simplifying itself and stopping me from doing all the heavy yaoi I wanted to XD It's still a beautiful piece, so please, feel free to enjoy^^ Thankyou so much for reading and commenting!~~**~~_

"Lost Beginnings"

_"this one goes out to the one i love...this one goes out to the one i left behind...a simple prop, to occupy my time...this one goes out to the one i love..."_

He knew where his little brother was. He always had. There had never been a time that his little ototo had left his mind's eye, let alone his true eyes. He knew the boy was hiding out with Orochimaru and he knew what Orochimaru was doing to his little brother. Fire lit behind his eyes at the thought of such a snake touching his ototo.

Rage filled his brother's heart and mind. Rage that he himself had placed there. A blind hatred for anything and everything that stood in his way of the goal his life centered around. Rage that Orochimaru fed into and fed off of...just waiting for the day that it became strong enough for him to use as a catalyst and take over the boy's very soul. He would tear the boy apart from the inside out. Just as Madarra had done to him, in the beginning.

Part of him had often toyed with the idea of leaving the Akatsuki...of stealing his baby brother from the jaws of the serpent...of starting a new life with the monster he had created. The logical part of him knew this was an assinine idea though, always gently pushing it to the back of his mind and locking it away with his other forbidden and foolish thoughts. Today though, today he would speak to his ototo. Today he would walk into the burrow of the snake and pull its prey from its coils. Today, he would tell his younger brother the things that had always needed to be said.

Sasuke sighed and ran a hand through his hair, closing his eyes as he trudged tiredly down the hallway. It was late, he wasn't even sure why he was up. Sleep had evaded him for a long time here...It had been two years since he had come looking for Orochimaru to teach him about the curse mark. And it had been close to two years since he had slept a full night.

He supposed his recent thoughts of Naruto were what was keeping him up tonight. Orochimaru had shown him some sort of crystal orb, offered to let him use it like the third Hokage once had. He had taken the offer, used the crystal for what it was for, and watched his best friend at his usual antics. It had hurt more than he had expected; which upset him more than he expected. He had given the crystal back to his master after that. Told him he didn't want to use the ugly thing anymore, that it was foolish and most likely broken. The snake never said a word in return; Sasuke knew he knew something was up.

He paused in the open hallway, looking out either side of the open arches, watching the wind whisper through the trees. He took in a deep breath, inhaling the scent of freshly turned soil, aged bark, and rich moisture in the air. He wasn't allowed outside very often. Supposedly too dangerous, though he had always thought the sentiment as stupid as the man who spoke it. He wasn't here to hide and he wasn't here to learn much from the old fool. He wanted one thing and one thing only. Power. Power enough to slay those who needed to be slain. And then he wanted to go home...

Something scuttled across the ground, rustling leaves and perking his ears. He failed to move, hands shoved deep into his robe pockets, face as empty as the air around him. Everything stilled and silenced itself, and he let out a soft breath, not having realized he had been holding it in. A thought struck him, some quiet chord that he didn't expect to hear. Naruto had been practicing a genjutsu when Sasuke had peered in on him. He had been training with another one of the sennins. He remembered when Naruto had trouble doing the simplest of genjutsus at the academy, so to see him performing some rather well crafted ones had surprised him.

Sasuke pulled his pale hands out of his pockets, blinking tiredly as he slowly rotated them in front of himself. There was a bandage revealing itself from beneath the hem of his robe sleeve...covering marks atop of marks. He could see the empty blue of his veins, twisting and writhing over the back of his palms before coiling around and beneath themselves, only to twine up the inside of his wrist. He looked at these veins often, trying to remind himself that warm blood coursed through him, that he was alive and physical.

Furrowing his brows lightly he curled his fingers, turning them this way and that, as if forming a ball of air. His lashes brushed over his cheeks as he all but shut his eyes, focusing energy between the air of his fingers, continuously rotating it to shape it. He released another breath, lifting his hands to greet it. The synergy whispered out into the night, clouding and whisping before slowly threading together to take shape. When he opened his eyes again his breath caught in his throat, swelling into a painful lump as it did, almost pricking tears to his eyes.

"Evening, little ototo..."


	2. Conjured Spirits

_~~**~~For those of you who don't know, I forgot to do this in the last piece^^;, "ototo" means "little brother" in japanese. "Nii-san" means "big brother" and "Aniki" is a very affectionate way of saying "big brother" ^^~~**~~_

Sasuke slid a step back, letting his brows furrow deeper, his angered confusion flitting across his face before he could catch it. "YOU...What are YOU doing here?" The words came out as more of a hiss than he expected. His eyes narrowed as a slow, calm smile split his brother's face in such a pleasant way he felt sick.

"Come now, ototo...You should know better than to ask stupid questions. I'm obviously the genjutsu you just conjured up." His hand languidly swept across the air in front of himself, paling against the inky black of his T-shirt. Sasuke scoughed, clenching his fist at his side before pushing it into his kimono pocket, trying to hide the anger that was beginning to manifest through the appendage.

"I'm no fool. I didn't conjure you up at all." He turned, narrowing his eyes to slits as he regarded his still smiling older brother. If you were to only look at Itachi's face, you'd think this was the nicest of conversations about the weather as of late. "I wasn't thinking of you TO conjure you up. At all."

Itachi let the smile flicker in his eyes before he killed it, keeping his happiness stretched across the lower half of his face within the confines of the emotionally empty mask he often wore. The child was such a smart boy. He could've been something great, had their clan not been what it was. Had they not needed to be exterminated. "Foolish ototo, I thought you were smarter than that." Sasuke was visibly trying to keep as calm as he was; and visibly failing. His hand was positively quivering beneath the folds of his rich blue robe.

"You know this genjutsu puts shape to whatever you wish for the most, to whatever is most prominent in your mind; whether it be back or forefront." Itachi let his smirk rise a bit higher now, slivers of bangs whisping across his line of vision as a breeze toyed with them. "It's said to be the most truthful of the genjutsus. I'm surprised you didn't know that, little brother." Once again the younger Uchiha pulled his eyes from the older, frowning at the dusty stones beneath his feet.

"I DID know that, NII-SAN..." He drug out the once fondly used term, letting his eyes harden as he did, venom dripping from his tone.

Somewhere inside Itachi felt a pang of very real pain.

"But, there's no way I could've conjured you. You know that as well as I do." He made a lazy gesture with his visible hand, sweeping it in front of himself in a halfhearted mimic of Itachi's movement. Every movement he made had ALWAYS felt like a halfhearted mimic of his older brother's movements. He let his onyx hues lock onto Itachi's own, boring into the ominous crimson hues. "I don't care about you enough for this genjutsu to work that way."

Sasuke had forgotten how fast his elder could move. He had forgotten how graceful and fluid his movements were. How beautiful he was as he rushed towards you with the intent to maim or kill in his crimson eyes.


	3. Mixed Emissions

The stone of the archway pillar was hard and unforgiving against Sasuke's spine as he slammed into it. Stars swept in front of his blood red eyes, the sharingon taking hold at the first sign of movement and threat. He winced, coughing loudly as Itachi's sinewy arm pressed hard across the breadth of his chest. His feet scraped the floor, seeking purchase, held just above reaching point.

The taller boy's breath was warm and moist as it grazed his cheeks, forcing him to turn away as an old shiver ran down his spine. "It seems you are still too slow and weak, little ototo." His lips brushed the round of Sasuke's face, caressing over high cheekbones before sliding over the boy's jawline.

"You certainly are strangely outgoing for a genjutsu conjure." Sasuke grimaced and pulled his face farther from his brother's, gripping at the arm still over his chest, attempting to push it back; he barely budged it. Itachi lifted his head, looking over his baby brother's face for the first time in years.

His free hand reached up to brush strands of ebony colored hair out of reflective onyx hues, shaded with thick lashes that brushed high and fine cheeks. Fingers deftly trailed down the side of the now older boy's face, as if attempting to find the little Sasuke lost inside. The pad of Itachi's thumb ran over Sasuke's lower lip, parting the boyish cupid's bow and lingering on the silken flesh. For a moment, each boy seemed lost to the other.

Sasuke slowly blinked, letting a slow breath roll over his brother's thumb, remembering the heat those fingers use to stoke within him. Itachi bent forward, lips hovering over Sasuke's own, almost as if he was waiting for permission. The younger Uchiha shifted, filling Itachi with an intense sense of dread. How had he parted himself from his Edan for this long? How had he managed to survive this long without his medicine? And how was he going to let go of his little Edan after this? Without any more hesitation Itachi pressed his lips to Sasuke's own, the boy releasing a soft whimper before relaxing completely beneath him.

The fire that engulfed him almost brought tears to his eyes. He cupped the back of the boy's head, crushing his mouth against his own, tilting his head a bit farther in attempt to get that much closer to him. Before long he had removed his arm from his brother's chest, opting to wrap it around him and draw his smaller body flush against him. Sasuke failed to resist, rather melted against him as easily as he had as a child. Sasuke's hand found its way to the fishnet V of Itachi's shirt, his fingers finding their way through the holes of the netting, threading through before pulling the chest closer to his.

He stood on tip-toes, not too much shorter than his prodigy of a brother now, but still a few inches too small. He whimpered again, his tongue colliding desperately with Itachi's as it probed farther and farther into the heat of his open mouth. He pulled back, panting softly as his brother's lips found their way to his throat, bruising the flesh they kissed and nipped. The older Uchiha's hand found its way into Sasuke's open robe front, dancing along the coiled muscles before smoothing over an ever steadily peeking nipple. "N-Nii-san...wait..." Sasuke gasped softly as the fingers closed over and pinched the dark flesh, tugging teasingly as Itachi's lips slid into a knowing smile over his throat.

His brother pulled back and looked down at him, a flame playing in the blood of his eyes that Sasuke didn't even realize existed any more. "You're very receptive, little ototo...seeing as I'm a genjutsu and all..." The raven smirked, his knee brushing between Sasuke's opened legs teasingly. Sasuke's eyes hardened a bit, a frown pulling the corners of his lips down.

"You're no genjutsu and I'm not the fool of a child I use to be." Itachi's fingers absentmindedly pinched at the nipple beneath them, making Sasuke flinch in his grasp. He grabbed his brother's thin wrist, pulling his hand out of his robe front and pushing it back to his own side, still frowning. Now Itachi was distantly frowning too, sensing the void opening between them once more. "Why did you come here? To spy on me? On Orochimaru-sama?" Itachi refocused his eyes, now glaring down his nose at the impudent child still so close to him.

"Baka." He scoughed quietly, looking away from the ever growing, ever reaffirming hatred forming in Sasuke's suddenly red eyes.

"Then what? Did you come to make me feel like a child again? To make yourself look desperate and stupid?" His eyes narrowed and hardened even farther, his voice coming out in a loud bark as he did.

Itachi almost snarled, reaching out and grabbing for his little brother's slender throat, pressing his palm farther and farther into the flesh of his windpipe as he squirmed beneath him. "Desperate and stupid? That's what you see when you look at me, Sasuke-kun?" Itachi bore his teeth through his snarl, Sasuke answering with a show of his own, fearful hisses of air escaping through them as he attempted to pull his elder's hand from his throat. "I came to SEE you. And to remind you of who MADE you. Who you BELONG to, heart and soul." Itachi glared at his brother's bared chest, the robe falling off the smooth round of one solid shoulder. He ripped it farther down, letting it fall in a droop around the boy's curved hip before tearing at the tight obi.

Sasuke began to kick, knocking Itachi's knees from under him, almost dropping him to the floor. The Uchiha prodigy was still too cunning though; always two steps ahead of his kid brother. He spun around, pulling the lithe boy up off the wall before pressing behind him, his grip on his throat easing ever so as he took his turn to lean against the wall now.

Sasuke coughed, bent forward as far as he could go, pulling air into his searing lungs as he did. "You didn't MAKE me. And I DON'T belong to you. I don't belong to ANYONE, let alone YOU." He glowered over his shoulder at his older brother, watching the taller boy regard him with tired and slightly disappointed eyes. The grip around his throat suddenly tightened enough to straighten him back up. It loosened again just as a second hand slid over Sasuke's thigh and to his groin. The youngest flinched, body responding to a touch it had long forgotten it missed.

"I told you to let the hate fuel you, ototo...I told you to push yourself to your limit...to come find me and make me atone for what I had done to you and the others..." Itachi's lips brushed over the nape of his neck, sending the hairs standing up over it as they did. His breath was hot as it skimmed his flesh, riddling his skin with pleasurable goosebumps. The free hand massaged calmly at his hardened length, rubbing smoothly through the light fabric of the kimono. Sasuke felt himself melting again, felt his knees beginning to buckle in the strong embrace. "But, I never told you to go and destroy yourself in effort to destroy me...I never told you to sell your soul to the devil."

The kiss on the side of his throat that followed those words sent fiery pin pricks down his spine. Sasuke's eyes jerked open as the curse mark began to flower over his shoulder and up his throat, a never ending fire alighting behind his eyes with a sharp pain. He jerked out of his brother's grasp, baring fangs at him as he slid a safe step back from the endlessly calm boy. Itachi regarded his little brother's glowing eyes with tired blood hues of his own, his lips folded into a set and empty line as the boy took a defensive stance against him.

"You don't get it, do you? You can't touch me like that anymore. Matter of fact, you can't touch me at all anymore!" Sasuke's voice was deepening as the curse spread, his fear and anger only fueling it needlessly. Itachi failed to reply to his little brother's sick grin. "You left me, NII-SAN. You killed EVERYONE and then LEFT ME BEHIND. You shamed me, made a joke of me and the clan...then you just left me to rot in misery atop it all. Do you honestly think, after all of that, that you can just waltz in here and take up like it never happened, ANIKI?" The rasp to his voice only made the mocking tone of the once treasured name hurt even more.

Itachi looked to the floor and away from the creature that was no longer his little ototo. "I did what had to be done." He turned and started through the archway with a quiet sigh of resignation and soundless feet. Sasuke glowered at him.

"You can't leave! Not again! I won't let you!" He ran after him, blindly wanting to embrace him and kill him. He would hold his aniki in an embrace he couldn't make a sound in. Itachi spun around, glaring now as he caught his little brother by the throat one last time, lifting him into the air only to watch him kick and writhe.

"It's now time for you to do what has to be done, little brother. It's time for you to put the hatred you've cultivated for so long to use. It's time for you to leave Orochimaru's side and do what fate has ordained you to do, little ototo."

He pulled the still struggling boy into him, his face inches from his own. "I will leave now. And you will go back inside instead of attempting to follow me. And, I'll see you again...very soon." He kissed his little Edan one last time, taking a final dose of his medicine before he had to seperate himself from it once more. Sasuke bit his lip, but calmed as soon as the blood hit his tongue. Itachi closed his eyes, feeling the boy relax in his hold, feeling his mouth open wider as it sought to greet and please him. He let go of his younger brother's throat, pulling away from the heat of his mouth with a slow suckle of his bottom lip.

When Itachi opened his eyes, he saw tears brimming in the now normal boy's coal black hues. "I came only to tell you to remember who made you and what they made you for, Sasuke-kun...Because the next time we meet...I will destroy you." He turned, forcing his legs to move away from the pull of the only thing that had ever brought him peace in the world. Sasuke's hitching breaths and quivering hands were enough to make him want to break down too. His hand slid farther and farther out of Sasuke's grasp, the youngest Uchiha holding on for as long as he could, until only their fingertips were connected.


	4. Fading

Sasuke fell to his knees when the prodigy child stepped from his sight, seeping back into the darkness of the woods he came from. Covering his eyes with shaking hands, he failed to even attempt to stop the tears, deciding now was as good a time as ever to mourn for the big brother he had lost so long ago...and would come to eventually lose again.

Itachi paused to watch Sasuke cry, watching with tired eyes as the teen morphed into the weeping child he had left among blood all those years ago. Wiping at his face with his sleeve and sobbing hopelessly as he tried to understand what had happened, what was happening, and what was going to happen. He listened to the phantom cries that had haunted his dreams every night ever since the incident,_ "Nii-san! Nii-san!" _

Itachi watched the boy gather himself up after a while, becoming the teenager he now was, still rubbing his robe sleeve over his weeping eyes. A small smile trailed the eldest Uchiha's lips, flickering in his eyes when his little brother looked around for him a final time before turning and walking back through the archway. Slowly, as his serene piece of Edan walked away from him, walked back into the lair of the snake that was corrupting him, he became the tiny boy once again.

Little pack strapped across his chest, flapping at his short clad hips, too big black T-shirt encasing his strong little form in effort to look like the nii-san he so blindly idolized. Turning, Itachi walked through the woods with that image still playing in his head, softer, happier echoes of _"Aniki!"_ trailing through his mind.

He had often thought of leaving Madarra and the Akatsuki...of stealing his baby brother from the pit of the deceptive snake...Of starting a new life with his little ototo.

_~~**~~The End. lol So, I know it was short, but I think it was pretty and hope y'all enjoyed it if you read it! Thankyou so much for reading and commenting!~~**~~_


End file.
